There's no questioning the Fiesta's ability to cover ground quickly on twisty B-roads, but my time in the hot hatch has been spent sitting in queues on the M25 and buzzing up and down the M40. The featherweight clutch, sharp gearchange and (most importantly) DAB radio made light work of traffic.

The quick steering rack, however, made high-speed cruising a bit of a chore, with constant tiny adjustments required to maintain a straight line in among the big trucks and middle-lane-rep-mobiles. All things considered, it's a small price to pay for such a well-sorted little driver's car.

By Tom LanganTom.Langan@whatcar.com

Week ending July 21Mileage 13,110Miles this week 400

Service day has come and gone, and the Fiesta is now fully fit and raring to go again (not that its verve had noticeably tailed off in the run up to the fettling).

Trust Ford in Thames Ditton was entrusted with the work, and was good throughout the proceedings, even when things went awry because of my ineptitude.

You see, I tried to book the car in using Ford's online booking service, but my computer crashed halfway through, so I started again in a state of pique, and promptly booked the car in for the wrong day. I was forced to call the dealership, who sorted out the booking quickly and pleasantly. They didn't even laugh at the way my online skills had been found wanting.

Shortly after, I received a call from the same dealer, to tell me that circumstances had left them short of technicians on the allotted day, and it would help if I could rebook for another time – which I duly did. They offered 10% off the price to sweeten the deal, too.

On the day in question, I left the car at the dealership and expected to hear nothing until the end of the day. Not so - the car was fully serviced and ready three hours later, and true to their word the bill was discounted as promised.

It would appear that the Fiesta's quite handy at this camping malarky. Not only did Vicky Parrott take it to Le Mans for the 24-hour race, but I also took it to the Goodwood Festival of Speed for a weekend of fast old racing cars, fireworks and barbecues.

I stuffed the boot full of sleeping bag, pillow, cooking facility and beer and took the backroads down to Goodwood.

The car was superb of the way there, never once flinching as the road scampered this way and that, and blasting past slower traffic wherever possible.

Its naturally firm-riding suspension meant I had to let the beer settle for a few moments once I got there, but that allowed me to get the boot unloaded and everything transferred to the motorhome that colleague Will Williams had acquired for the weekend.

Didn't I mention a motorhome? Ah. Okay, perhaps 'camping' was stretching the point a little. Nonetheless the Fiesta took everything I needed for the weekend with ease, it made a hoot of the trips there and back, and it did it all at an average of 36.3mpg. What a car.